Like a Joke That's Left Unsaid
by FightForTheFuture
Summary: Tried to post earlier but the format was messed up! (My life is a nightmare) Again, it's a one shot, super sappy! Please read and review! :)


One shot. Takes place after the Season 2 finale.

_"How do we move on?"_

_"I don't think I can."_

The conversation played over in his mind as he sat in his dimly lit living room. He and Angie had left the precinct hours ago, but there was no way he'd be able to sleep. Instead he drank a lukewarm cup of coffee and stared at nothing. Nothing could distract him from the inevitability of the conversation before.

What seemed inevitable was the idea that Angie would quit the force, and he would be paired up with someone else. Furthermore, it seemed like if this happened, the odds of seeing Angie as often as before wouldn't be so great. This broke his heart.

He was a smart man; he knew that other partners wouldn't be so heartbroken if they were split up-annoyed maybe-but not heartbroken. But he and Angie were not like other partners. The connection between them was often left unsaid, but did not go unnoticed. Dr. Betty Rogers noticed it, Detective Brian Lucas noticed it, Sergeant Mark Cross begrudgingly noticed it, but no one spoke about it.

Oscar Vega and Angie Flynn loved each other, this no one could deny.

Yet she pushed him away, not wanting to hurt the one person she needed most. And he was a gentleman, so he never pushed back; something he knew she admired greatly. So their friendship carried on as just that, a beautiful friendship.

But that friendship had recently began to crumble, and now it seemed like it had to end. In Detective Vega's mind, there was nothing left to lose. He could think of only one way to save their friendship:

Turn it into something more.

Angie Flynn tried to sleep after the day she had. It was nearly 3 AM and still not one minute of sleep. It was pointless. She got up, went into her kitchen, and began brewing a cup of coffee.

Drinking the coffee, she began going over the events of that day in her mind. After such an exhausting day, two things stood out: Vega saving her life, and then telling him that she couldn't be a cop anymore.

Her reckless decision not to shoot Slater could have gotten her killed. She knew this. She also knew that her death would have subsequently, figuratively killed Vega. Because everyone knew it, but noone confronted it.

They were in love.

She loved him so much that she felt obligated to protect him for her reckless ideals and mess of a life. If he got too involved, she would bring him down with her, obliterate any chance he had of a peaceful life.

Strange how she still wanted him though. The way he held her today, she wanted to be held like that every day of her life. She wanted to wake up smiling next to him every morning, drink coffee with him on chilly evenings, feel the muscles he hid under those crisp work shirts… She stopped herself.

She had fantasized about these seemingly harmless things before, but she could never try to date her partner. She wouldn't want to mess up his life too. So again tonight she pushed him away, only half wishing that he would stay away.

Vega cursed himself as he crawled into his car and drove to Angie's house. What if she wasn't awake? What if he went there for nothing? And was never able to muster up this courage again?

What if she said no? What if she didn't really love him like he thought she did? What if this pushed her further away?

But that's the trouble with "what ifs," you never actually know what will happen until it does. He cursed himself again.

Pulling up to Angie's driveway, he saw a light on in her living room. His heart sped up quickly, this was good and bad. She was awake to hear him out, but what if she heard exactly what she didn't want to.

He had to take his chance.

He walked up to her door and gave three, rapid knocks. She opened the door almost as rapidly.

"Vega. I saw lights in the driveway and wondered who it could be. Uhhh, come in." She gestured, a puzzled look on her face. They both sat down on her couch. "Vega, about our conversation earlier…"

"Angie, I don't want you to give up. I don't want you to leave the force."

"I don't have much of a choice Vega. Once Mark and I report what we did, I'll get suspended for at least some length of time. If I come back, I'll just have this shame hanging over my head. No one will ever look at me the same." She finished exasperatedly.

"I'll always look at you the same Ang. You'll always be the same great detective to me."

She gave a melancholy smile at the floor, then said, "That's sweet Oscar, but I'm not a great detective. I'm a big fucking wreck."

Oscar scooted a little closer to her on the couch and grabbed her left hand with both of his. She squeezed him bottom hand slightly. "Whatever you do Angie, don't completely push me away, let me see you, and maybe I can show you why it's okay for you to come back to the force. And why it's okay to be with me."

Her eyes serious, she looked at his pleading eyes and said, "What do you mean, Oscar?"

He grabbed her right hand with his left, now holding both of her hands, and said, "I want to be here for you, Ang. I want you to lean on me, I want to help you through this, and I want to give you what you deserve, but for some reason don't think you do.

"Oscar.." she started –

"No Angie, you deserve to be openly loved. You deserve to have someone hold you on hard days and take care of you the rest of the time. I hope I'm not wrong about the unspoken connection between us but my job as a detective is technically to see the things that others don't and I think you can see it too."

He paused briefly and looked into her eyes, brimming with tears. "Angie. I love you. I love you and I want to be here for you right now. Right now and every moment after that."

"Oscar, I love you too, I do, but you don't know what you're getting into. I'm a lot to deal with in a relationship." She pleaded, choking back tears at the same time.

But she had said enough. She said she loved him, and that was all he needed to here. He moved his right hand to her cheek and cupped it, wiping a stray tear away with his thumb as it fell. This time, she moved a little closer, just needing to feel the warmth coming from his body, though she knew she'd tried to protest his wanting to be in a relationship with her later.

Sitting thigh to thigh now, he took her movement as an invitation to move a little closer, and he gently kissed her forehead. A few more tears rolled down her face that he tried to wipe away. With that she leaned in and kissed his bearded chin, looking at his lips right after, then finding his eyes. She knew that he wouldn't push any further if she did not want him to, so she moved her right thumb against his lips, letting him know it was okay to kiss her. Both moved their faces closer until their lips barely met, and then he pressed his lips a little harder onto hers. He kissed her passionately and she kissed him with every emotion she had felt throughout that day, including the feeling of love he had brought to her now.

When the kiss finished they looked at each other and smiled. His toothy, crinkle-eyed grin and her cute, mischievous smile.

"What're your plans now, Detective Vega?" Angie asked, still smiling.

"Actually, I have nowhere to be." He replied, grinning.

"I think a rebroadcast of tonight's hockey game is on. You up for it?" Angie asked.

"In that case, it looks like I'm staying here for the night."


End file.
